


thunder

by Lee_Mix



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-29
Updated: 2016-09-29
Packaged: 2018-08-18 13:48:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 524
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8164076
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lee_Mix/pseuds/Lee_Mix
Summary: Adrien asks “why”. Marinette has no answers.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Vent pieces. Aren't they always fun?

You have no answers.

A superhero you may be when the crowd’s gasp, when they cheer, when they criticise, when they taunt;  _“the little darling heroine of Paris, always skimming over rooftops and defeating foes in her wake; where does she find the time? Where does she find the energy?”_ The honest truth of the matter is that you don’t know–you don’t know how you have the upkeep of seeing people’s emotions manifest in such ugly, twisted ways, but you do anyway because heroes don’t question the pains of their foes; they are the ones lending an ear to the reasons why.

But you have no answers when it’s the heroes who fall into that same grief.

You never expected to find out your loveable hellion’s identity this way. Perhaps on a veranda amidst the cobblestone streets of Paris as you stared up at dusk’s painting of the city skies; or a moment in the snow after a heated battle and all the secrecy just became too much for one pair of shoulders to bear.

Not this way. Not amongst dust and rubble and the echo of a madman’s delusional devotion to his long-dead wife.

Not to the golden-haired boy who holds the black mask in his hand like it was his eyes.

“Cha–Adrien…”

You don’t know how to approach him. You were nothing more than “sweet, classmate Marinette” up until now. “Ladybug” was everything you weren’t, and he can’t meet you face without the mask. 

(The blood around your face _doesn’t qualify–_ it’s just another painful reminder.)

“Why, Mari?”

Your breathing hitches in your throat.

His voice is so _broken._

“Why?” He asks you again. Or the wind. Or the ghosts of his past. Or every listening ear. Either way, nobody answers his pathetic utterance, and you feel your heart splitting in two. “Why did it have to be _him?_ ”

_Why did it have to be his father? Why did it have to be the only parent he has left that didn’t leave?_

“I know he was cold, I know he wasn’t always around, but–but dammit, Mari, I thought he _cared_ more than that! More than to abandon _me_ for some… some fools chance to get my Mom back, I…”

Broken laughter sounds like a celebratory choir singing eulogies for the dead and the damned out of key. From him, it sounds like hell itself is weeping.

_And, God, how your heart breaks to see him fall to his knees and sob._

“ _ **WHY?**  _Why did it have to be HIM? Why couldn’t your _stupid powers_ save HIM?! Why…”

He curls in on himself. You reach out your hand, but it just drips with blood and creates red spots in the black rubble.

What right do you have to comfort the son of the man you failed to save?

His question–one word, one beat–rattles you like thunder.

_“Why?”_

You have no answers.

Heroes aren’t supposed to _have_ answers, they’re supposed to _be_ answers.

And you’re reminded every time you look at his broken smile, that all you are is a pathetic question mark of a rhetoric question never answered.


End file.
